Thank you for your interest in The Stuffed Owl Louisville Fiction Group. If you have joined our group on Meetup, we have listed you as a pending member. Please do not RSVP to any meetings until your membership is approved. Please review the following information about membership and, at the bottom, the steps you must take for admission into our group.

ABOUT US:

We are a group of adult (18, and over) writers who share works-in-progress and provide feedback on technique, style, organization, and editing. We hope that each member will contribute by bringing writing and offering honest, constructive criticism. Our meeting environment is supportive and friendly and, most importantly, respectful. We are not an "everyone's great" and "write what you want" kind of group. Our goal is to help each other improve our craft. By participating, we hope that you will develop the ability to weed through a large amount of advice and find your personal voice and style.

We do not welcome previously published work (self or other). We also do not welcome non-fiction, memoirs, Children's, Young Adult, screenplays, plays, or poetry. We write and critique novels and short stories of all other genres.

DUES:

Dues offset Meetup and group expenses approved by the organizers.

NO REFUND POLICY

We have a strict no-refund policy for new membership and annual dues paid. We do not offer refunds.

NO SHOWS

Seats at the table are important to our members and hard to get. If you no-show for a meeting you are signed up to attend, we ask you to pay a $10.00 fee before you RSVP to another meeting. If you are a no-show for more than one meeting, we may terminate your membership.

MEETUP INFO

Our meetings are usually the 3rd Saturday of the month at 9:30 a.m. The meetings are pushed out when the organizers have time and are offered on a first-come to the first 8 members to RSVP, with a wait list. Please do not RSVP if you are a pending member.

Remember to change your RSVP status ASAP if you find you cannot attend.

The system automatically bumps the first person on the waitlist up when someone cancels the night before the meeting. If you are on the waitlist, please check the Meetup site the night before and morning of the meeting to determine if you've been bumped into the group. If you can't attend, change your RSVP so the system puts someone else in.

PRESENTING YOUR WORK AT GROUP

Do not bring writing to your first meeting. The maximum word limit is 3,000 words. We ask all members to upload their work through Meetup (under the MORE-FILE tab, through a desktop interface) at least two days prior to the meeting. We have found this helps immensely with feedback as it gives readers time to let the information sink in before they attend the meeting and review the work at the table. If someone prints your work, we ask that they leave a comment on that month's Meetup comment section, letting you know so you don't have to print them a copy. If you can't upload, please see the attending list to judge how many copies to bring. (Be sure to bring one for yourself so you can have one to make notes on.)

GETTING FEEDBACK

When it is time for your piece to be read (we don't read aloud), we ask that you give no information, problem lists, or expectations up front, unless you need to bring the reader up to speed on where the chapter is in your manuscript. In that case, we ask you to write a few short sentences and add those to the beginning of your piece. For example, "What the reader knows to this point: Johnny met Sally in New York and they married a week later. Against Sally's wishes, Johnny has flown her parents in from Florida as a surprise. Sally's mother just revealed that she has been married twice before and her last divorce isn't yet final." (This description counts in your word count, so try to keep it brief.)

Questions are often necessary when a writer is receiving feedback and we understand this. However, we ask that you-the-writer try to limit your personal comments so that you get the most feedback possible in the short time we have to work on your piece.